Radio modules are increasingly used for M2M (machine-to-machine) applications. Typical areas of application are wireless control and regulation functions, inspection and monitoring functions and telemetric tasks, for example. On account of the very good network availability, such M2M radio modules primarily support cellular radio standards such as GSM or UMTS.
Providers of such radio networks place great value on effective utilization of their extended network capacities and therefore prefer mobile terminals which generate a large volume of call or data traffic. In contrast to this, mobile terminals which produce no data traffic for a relatively long period are no longer supported by the network operators and are logged out of the network.
However, an M2M radio module which has logged out now has only very restricted functional use. Although the M2M radio module can still independently initiate data traffic, because in this case it logs itself in again, it can no longer be addressed externally and therefore cannot receive any commands. This counteracts any great advantage of the radio module in M2M applications.
As a remedial solution, M2M radio modules that have been logged out by a provider can be logged in again manually. However, this requires direct action on the radio module, which is contrary to the desired pure remote operation and maintenance by radio.
Another option for keeping an M2M radio module constantly logged in is for data records to be sent periodically with a period length which is shorter than the maximum login time permitted by the provider. Such pseudo data traffic gives rise to unnecessary costs, however.